Dionach- Guardian
by baby-kitsune9
Summary: The Avengers got themselves into a jam with a Hydra base. They got captured. They were chained, beaten, tortured yet so very far from broken. They knew that the job of a hero came with risks. That there was often times someone who wouldn't return home. Which was why it was so shocking that she showed up to free them. Avengers/Fem Ichigo. no pairings yet. I can't make up my mind.
1. Chapter 1

It was just one of those odd, life altering moments. Because in all honesty- it was. Life altering, I mean. His blue-green eyes locked on her the moment that she walked through the door and he hadn't been able to look away from her since. He was too busy studying her to even bother to pay attention to much of anything else.

Everything from her looks, to her style of clothing, to the strangely confident yet uncomfortable way that she carried herself when she moved all practically screamed, **_MINE_**, to him.

She turned her head and snuck a glance at him from underneath her lashes and his mouth went dry in response. Not because she was being flirtatcious or coy, but because she had _noticed_ him checking her out and seemed to be just as curious about him as he was about her.

It was adorable really. Or rather it would have been if not for the severity of the situation.

And by severity, he was talking about the Hydra base that he and the others had been held captive in for almost two in a half weeks now where they were being beaten and tortured for information that _none_ of them could hand over no matter what. They had all resigned themselves to the possibility of dying here when she had slipped into their cell.

She frowned after a moment or so of looking at them and then turned her back to them to peek through the small slot on the steel door as Tony managed to rasp out, "Who-" He couldn't really complete his question due to the coughing fit that overtook him. But the question was pretty obvious to all of them. Even her.

Who was she? Or rather- what _should_ have been asked was; was she a friend or foe?

Cause she didn't look like one of Hydra's goons. She wasn't exactly dressed like any of them either. In fact, a girl with her looks and current state of dress tended to stick out like a sore thumb. Who the fuck walked into a dangerous organization run by lunatics wearing nothing but a leather jacket, black T-shirt and faded jeans anyways? A wise person would have come in decked out in armor that was armed to the teeth.

No- she looked far too pure. Too fucking _innocent_ to be in such a dark and terrible place.

The moment that Tony started coughing, her head snapped back around and she moved towards him almost automatically. As if she were being driven by instinct to check on him.

Steve let out a warning sound and tried to stop her, the heavy chains around his wrists and ankles clanking as he lunged for her in a vain attempt to save Tony from her.

She paused only long enough to glance at the chains with another frown and then pulled something small out of one of her jacket pockets and tossed it to him and merely said, "I'm assuming that you know how to pick a lock." And then started walking again as Steve stood there with the lock picking kit held tightly in his hands and a totally lost look on his bruised face.

The moment that she reached Tony, she gently put her hands underneath his chin and lifted his head just so- which was enough to check any injuries that he possibly had on his face, throat and chest and allowed him to look at her, his dark eyes were tired and wary as he studied her even as she ran her long slender fingers through his messy dark hair.

"Hey, you okay?"

He made a weak sound before murmuring, "Peachy." in a sarcastic tone that had the girl thinning her lips a little bit before she slowly lowered his chin back to his chest and then reached out to touch one of his wrists, which was also locked in a heavy chain.

She muttered something under her breath that none of them could hear and then moved around Tony's side and grabbed the chain and gave it a good yank.

The clanking sound caused Steve to freeze up for a moment and look towards her with a questioning look on his face before he realized what she was doing. He started to open his mouth to tell her not to bother, the chains were made of steel and titanium. And were far more difficult to break than they looked since even _he_ with his enhancements hadn't been able to break them as of yet- when he and the others heard a loud creaking sound.

The sound of straining metal moments before it broke and all eyes suddenly flew to their visitor in wide eyed disbelief as she broke the chains holding Tony captive. Tony started to fall, but she caught him and slowly lowered him to the floor and then moved on to the next person while Tony sat there trying to catch his breath.

She broke a couple more chains and gently eased Nat, and Clint down to the floor as well before then making her way over to Steve and asking, "You got the chains or-" He huffed and held one of his wrists up for her to see. The chain was gone, but now that the others were free even he knew that it was only a matter of time before _someone_ came.

She gave him a tight lipped smile and then grabbed a small length of chain a little bit away from his wrist and snapped it like she had the others. Effectively freeing his hands, before then taking the little lock pick from his grasp and getting to work on the shackles around his ankles.

"Who are you?" He asked, feeling the need to get to know his/his friend's savior just a little bit. However she didn't answer him. Her entire focus was fixed solely on her current task as he tried again.

"Can you tell us your name?" Again she didn't answer him. Though the more she worked, the closer he studied her before finally realizing that she was maybe a tad bit younger than she looked and asked/demanded to know how old she was. She froze up for a moment, her hands going completely and utterly still as they both heard Tony suck in a ragged breath across the room and rasp out as he narrowed his dark eyes at her.

"Adult?" Before then turning around and hissing out in a disbelieving tone, _"Kid?" _

She ignored him and went back to work on Steve's shackles and with a soft clicking sound, freed him completely. Steve tried not to be upset about the fact that a kid was wandering around a Hydra base- freeing them. Truly he was trying. But after being caught and tortured by them, and after seeing his friends beaten and tortured by them- his anger was more than just a tad bit out of his control.

Especially given the fact that if Hydra got their hands on the girl, they would likely either kill her or use her for experimentation until she expired.

So naturally, he wasn't all that keen on letting anyone from Hydra anywhere near her. And from the grimly determined looks he was getting from Tony and the others- he could tell that they were totally on board with anything that kept her from Hydra's grasp and got them _all_ out alive.

"Do you have a plan?" Steve finally asked the girl, wondering just how much thought that she had put into freeing them.

"I do," She said before fishing an ear piece out of it's hiding spot underneath the collar of her jacket and put it in her ear and started talking. "This is Guardian, I have eyes on the Avengers. I need an extraction team and medics ASAP."

Steve blinked upon hearing her speak into the tiny mic and blinked yet again in dismay as someone responded.

_"Roger that Guardian. The extraction team is heading to you now. Just keep your heads down." _

"Understood," She said as she then took the piece out and placed it underneath her collar again and then motioned for Steve to sit down. "We'll be out of here in another..." Tugging up her jacket sleeve, she checked the digital watch on her wrist and then continued speaking. "Fifteen to twenty minutes."

Barely five minutes later, there was a loud boom from an explosion that rocked the building. And barely a minute later the blaring of alarms filled the base on the heel of panicked running, screaming and gun fire.

Ten minutes later the gun fire was right outside of their cell door and then once it stopped, they all tensed, getting ready to fight as the heavy door swung open and a couple of other kids peeked in and smiled brightly.

"Hey Guardian, we're here to take you and your new friends home," A short, petite, dark haired girl with wide violet eyes said as she stepped a little bit further into the room and handed a semi automatic machine gun to the girl that had saved them. "Oh, and I come with a gift-" The girl said after she took a moment to scan the Avengers before then saying, "We left you some stragglers in one of the labs. You're new orders are to interrogate them and make them tell you _everything_ about their plans. We'll go ahead and take this lot out of here since their so banged up and in need of medical help. Grab an extra com from Sado on your way out and call us once your done. And kid, _have fun_."

"Okay. Later Ruki." The girl said as she made her way towards the door, pausing for several moments to look over the other kids standing there when one of the boys, a tall guy with wild red hair pulled back into a ponytail said,

"Ruki, I'm going with her just in case."

"That isn't your job Renji."

"Well, fighting and interrogating people it isn't exactly her job either Ruki. Especially since she's a _civilian_." The guy snapped. The violet eyed girl sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose for a moment as Steve hissed out,

"She's a civilian?" Steve said in a panicked sounding tone. "As in someone not only grabbed her but dropped her here- _behind_ enemy lines? Where anything can literally happen to her due to the fact that she isn't fucking trained?"

Someone, Nat maybe? Muttered loudly enough for them all to hear, "He said a bad word." Which caused Clint and Tony to both say,

"I didn't know that he even knew bad words."

"Someone owes money to the curse jar."

Steve bared his teeth at them and _snarled_, effectively silencing anymore comments before they could be uttered as he glared at the small teen in front of him with a dark expression that bordered on murderous.

"It's true that she has no real training, however Guardian is far from defenseless. Before reaching your cell, she not only snuck in, and gathered intel that would be useful to us in retrieving you all. But she killed pretty much half of the people here in an effort to thin their numbers down and keep us from being overwhelmed by them."

"That's no excuse!"

"I never said that it was, Captain Rogers, now if your finished arguing- I'd like to get you and your friends out of here. Some of you are looking a little bit rougher than others." Ruki snapped at him in irritation before motioning for the others waiting by the door to come in and collect anyone that was too injured to stand on their own.

As the others were being carried out Steve glared at the girl again and said, "If anything happens to her..." his voice trailed off threateningly as he glowered at her.

"Nothing will," Ruki assured him in a soft tone. "I know that I've come across as something of a bitch here Captain, but Guardian is a very close friend of mine. I'd literally die for her. So if anything should happen, I _can_ and_ will_ come back with some of the others to help her. Aside from that though, you'll probably see her back home in a few hours."

Steve narrowed his eyes at her, but didn't say anything more as she gently placed a tiny hand on his back and ushered him out of the cell and to freedom.


	2. Chapter 2

It was several hours later before Steve or anyone else saw the girl- _Guardian_, again. And by that time, they had refused to sleep or eat anything despite their obvious exhaustion and hunger. Though they hadn't bothered to refuse any medical care which was provided by a nice high school girl with auburn colored hair via her special ability.

Soten Kisshun.

Which was apparently the ability to bend time and space and_ reality_ to her very will. Which they were admittedly very curious about for obvious reasons since it could be utilized in several different ways, including being used as a weapon. Which was a huge, huge concern to them all.

But not right then.

Steve was pacing around in a pair of clean sweat pants that he'd been provided by the person behind their rescue. Some shady platinum blond guy with obvious military knowledge and training, yet claimed to be nothing more than a humble shop keeper- when Guardian finally walked in and literally made a beeline for the plate of grilled cheeses that had been left for them along with the huge ass pot of soup and grabbed one of the sandwiches.

The kid's hair was damp from having recently showered, and she was wearing a pair of pastel blue satin PJ's as the nice young lady from before trailed along behind her and smiled in amusement as she started to tear into the sandwich that she'd grabbed.

"You seem hungry." She said to the taller girl as she swallowed what was in her mouth without even bothering to chew.

"I am," She rasped out before going on to say. "I haven't eaten in nearly a week." The auburn haired girl's expression flickered between concern and just a tad bit alarmed before she said,

"I'll go see if some more food can be made for you then."

"Please," Guardian said in a pitiful tone as her friend shook her head and then left the room. Leaving her alone with them and their food. Which she was eyeing in a odd manner before finally asking them, "None of you have eaten yet, have you?"

"We had other things on our mind." Steve said, trying hard to resist the urge to grab the girl up and check her over for any injuries that she may have received after they had left the base.

She nodded her head in understanding and then tapped the plate with her fingernail and muttered, "Eat something. And then rest. We're trying to get into contact with your friends and family to let them know where you are and that you're okay."

"And we appreciate that. As well as the rescue," Nat said as she started to push herself upright from the cot that she was lying on only to hiss in pain as her ribs throbbed. The girl moved away from the food automatically and made her way over to her and slowly helped her sit up while somehow managing to prevent her from hurting herself further. "Thank you." Nat said softly once she was sitting up comfortably before then saying, "We have questions."

"I'll...go get Kisuke then." She said as she started to move away to leave when Steve said gently.

"We would rather ask you, if you don't mind."

She frowned and looked at each of their faces for a moment, noting their curious/anxious expressions before then sighing. "Fine. I'll answer what I can. Just keep in mind that if I don't answer something it's either because I don't know the answer or it's simply not my right to answer."

"That's fine." Tony said from where he was laying.

"We'd be grateful for any answers that you may be able to give us." Steve said politely. She nodded her head and moved, a little bit more slowly this time so that she didn't give any of them the impression that she was about to bolt from the room, and found a nice comfy place on the floor in the middle of the room and then waited for someone to ask her something.

Predictably the first questions were, what is your name and age. Which was only a little bit disappointing to her, though she understood their need to ask her such things. She didn't have to actually answer them though since Rukia chose that moment to poke her head in and smiled at her before telling her that her dad was on the phone. And she even used her _name_.

Well, not her whole name, mind you. But her first one was enough to give the men and woman in the room a clear idea of where to start their search for information once they left Kisuke's and went home.

Rolling her eyes at Rukia as she cringed a little bit at her slip up and mouthed the word, _Sorry_, to her as she reached out and snatched the phone from her before then quickly scampering out of the room again as she threw a pillow at her. Huffing softly, she cast an apologetic look at the others who made 'go on' motions with their hands to encourage her to go ahead and take the call and then put her dad on speaker.

"Hey dad."

_"Ichigo! My darling daughter- has the storm passed? Can you finally come home again? You're sisters and I have been checking ditches all over the city to make sure that you weren't dead somewhere."_

She made a funny face and then reached up to rub at her forehead with one hand for a second before then saying in a pleading tone, "Tell me that you didn't find anything."

_"We did! Four bodies in four different locations. Poor Yuzu hasn't slept in weeks due to the nightmares. And Karin is totally convinced that there is a serial killer on the loose... Is there a serial killer on the loose? I told Karin that I'd ask." _

The funny face that she had made morphed into a pained expression as she said, "Probably. Did you mark the locations on the map in my room?"

_"Yeah, I did." _

"I'll come home tonight and check on them then. Maybe my being home will help Yuzu calm down enough to sleep without nightmares-"

_"Oh sweetheart, I didn't tell you that to make you feel bad. Much less like you need to hit the streets and go after whoever is killing people, just in case. I told you that because we've been worried about you and haven't exactly had a whole lot of info from Kisuke or your friends to work with lately." _

"Sorry."

_"Don't be. I know why you stay gone so much. And I understand. And though your sisters are still pretty young, they understand too. We just can't help but miss you when you disappear on us." _

"I miss you guys too dad."

There was amused laughter from the other end of the line before her dad said, _"Wow. I always thought that I'd die before you admitted that you missed me for anything. Is the world ending? Cause I feel like the world is ending." _

"Dad."

He laughed again. _"Sorry, it's been a while so I had to pick on you some. I miss you too kid. Just come home soon, okay?" _

"I will."

_"Alright then. Talk at you later." _

The line went dead after that and she flipped the phone closed and then set it aside and then looked at them expectantly as Clint said, "You're dad seems nice."

"He is..." She said with a small frown before tacking on. "Mostly."

They ignored her 'mostly' comment about her dad and started to ask questions again and learned that she was a high school kid too. Though she was several years younger than they had expected her to be. Sixteen was a far cry from eighteen or twenty something. Which is what they had been expecting her to tell them was her age.

She was a civilian with latent abilities- though she refused to say what any of them were aside from the vague mentioning of how they had helped her to find them back at the Hydra base. She had _no_ formal combat training, but excelled at fighting nevertheless.

Her only family was her dad and two younger sisters.

She didn't tell them who her friends were. Nor how she had gotten involved with the shady shop keeper guy. and though they had had more questions, they had let the matter rest for the time being once her pretty friend returned a while later with a bunch of food and some tea for her.

While she quietly tucked into her meal, Steve and the others decided to go ahead and eat something too since they were starving. And by the time the food that they'd been given was all gone, Ichigo was slumped over where she sat, fast asleep with one of her chop sticks still in her mouth and the other lying in her lap.

Steve shook his head at the sight as he carried everyone's dishes back over to the table where the food had been originally and gently set them down before then turning to carefully collect the girl from the floor.


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning was slightly more hectic than any of them had expected it to be. Especially since everyone was starting to move around a little bit more. Even Nat, who was being slowed by her busted ribs was up and moving around some.

One fo the first things that any of them had noticed, was that Ichigo had left the bed that Steve had put her in the night before. And was once again on the floor asleep. She had also gained a few friends where she was sleeping. The auburn haired young lady and the dark haired one from before, Ruki were both present. One was leaning into Ichigo's side while the other was curled up and using the girl's lap as a pillow.

Shaking his head in bemusement, Steve eyed the three teens curiously as the door to the room opened and the blond guy- Mr. Shady the shopkeeper, peeked in and then snorted. "I see that the girls made themselves comfortable. Did the rest of you sleep alright?"

"We slept like the dead." Tony said. Nat and Clint echoing him as Steve looked at the girls again and then frowned while he wondered idly _why_ he hadn't woken up when the two girls had come into the room. He usually wasn't a deep sleeper. It was a side effect of the serum.

In fact he rarely slept a full eight hours nightly. And he couldn't have possibly been so exhausted that he'd fall asleep and leave himself and his friends vulnerable to the possibility of an attack. He was more responsible than that.

"You're wondering why you didn't wake up when Rukia and Orihime came in." It wasn't a question, but it caught Steve off guard anyways.

"I- uh...yeah." Steve said lamely. Shady smiled at him and then pointed to the three girls.

"It's a particular talent of Ichigo's. Whether she's awake or asleep, she can somehow mask the presence of others."

"Oh?"

"Hn," The man hummed before then saying. "It's simply a talent of hers. Of course, it sort of helps that her own presence is overwhelmingly strong. Just not in a heavy or alarming way. Frankly I think it's _neat_. I've been trying to figure out just what all she can hide with her presence. But she tends to dig her heels in since everything I do comes perilously close to an experiment of some sort." He said with an amused grin.

"She doesn't like science?" Steve asked, wondering what exactly the guy meant by 'experiment' and deciding to sort of play dumb a little bit.

The blond chortled at him, "Playing the dumb blond doesn't suit you, Captain." He then said as he looked back over at the girls again before sobering and then saying, "Ichigo isn't overly fond of _any_ type of experiments, not even small ones, due to the fact that her very existence _is_ one."

"Huh?"

"It's a long story. And it's hardly one that should be told to anyone who's merely curious. There's far too much that you simply shouldn't know. And Ichigo...she fucking _hates_ it when the whole ordeal even is mentioned in passing."

"O-Oh." Steve stammered out, not knowing what else to say as the guy slipped into the room and quietly walked over to the small teen-pile and then knelt down and reached out and brushed several strands of Ichigo's long strawberry blond hair back from her face. Eliciting a twitch and a moan from the girl as she slowly stirred and then opened her eyes.

"Hey."

"Hey."

"Sleeping good?"

"Stupid question."

The man chuckled quietly as the girl turned her head to look around before spotting her two friends and then started swearing as the guy laughed again, a little bit louder this time. "Calm down, kid. I think Rukia and Orihime really missed you since you've been gone. So why not let them sleep like this for just a little bit longer, hn?"

She quieted down and seemed to mull over his words before huffing a little bit and muttering, "Yeah, okay."

"Good girl. You should catch a few more winks yourself. You've been working far too hard lately and haven't had any down time. I'll send one of the kids to come and get your three when it's time for breakfast. Okay?"

Ichigo barely nodded before she was out again.

Getting back to his feet, the guy shook his head at the weirdness of his teen friends and then motioned for the others to follow him. They followed him because of their curiosity and nothing else as he led them down the hall to a spacious room with a large, round oak table in the middle of the room surrounded by cushions.

"Go ahead and have a seat, everyone-" The guy said politely before then tacking on. "Breakfast should be ready in just a little bit since I doubt that the food given to you last night did much towards sustaining you after spending so long in captivity. The kids should be joining us in a little bit, because they are likely starving too. So I hope none of you mind overly much that the place will be turning into a mad house."

"Thanks. We appreciate it." Tony said as he brushed by him.

Clint murmured something about _liking_ mad houses as he and Nat shuffled past him to claim their own cushions? And Steve took a moment to look the man dead in the eyes and nod his head at him before moving on as well.

The man waited until Steve was seated comfortably before he bothered to claim his own place at the table as he said kindly, "We managed to get a hold of Miss Potts late last night-" Tony perked up a little bit upon hearing this, however managed to keep his mouth shut so that the man could speak. Allowing him to continue unhindered. "And informed her of where you all are as well as how each of you are currently doing. I suspect that she and a few of your friends from New York will be here in another few hours to collect the lot of you and take you back home to recuperate."

The moment that he stopped speaking they began to bombard him with questions.

"Really?" The red head asked in an almost hopeful voice.

"Pepper is coming?" Tony asked anxiously knowing that the woman would likely give him the lecture of a lifetime for being stupid enough to get caught by Hydra and _not_ calling her and let her know.

"What about Bucky, Bruce and Thor? Are they okay?" Steve asked anxiously as he recalled that they had had to leave the three behind after they had gotten injured on a previous mission.

The guy smiled and quietly assured them that their friends were fine. And were probably also on the plane to come and collect them. Their reactions to this news varied of course. Tony practically started crying and had to have Clint slip an arm around him and pull him close to him so that he could cry without humiliating himself too much.

Steve might have cried too if not for the fact that he was good at bottling things up. Nat smiled and exchanged a look with Clint over the top of Tony's head.

The guy quietly cleared his throat to regain their attention before gently saying, "I know that you're all overwhelmed at the moment and all. But...seeing as you were pumping Ichigo for information last night, I thought that you might want to get some of the stuff that she couldn't tell you out of the way before breakfast."

Tony sniffled and turned his head a little bit while still resting it on Clint's shoulder and looked at him strangely for a moment before asking, "You're going to tell us stuff?"

"Well, since I know that you're all curious- then yes. I thought it would be the polite thing to do." The man said with a smile.

"What's your name again?" Clint asked.

"Kisuke Urahara. I run the shop that you're currently staying in."

"No, I mean- Who are you really?" Clint emphasized as something akin to surprise flickered in the blondes expression for a moment before he carefully masked it.

"Well, that's a little bit of a long story. And by long- I mean it spans several hundred years." Kisuke said awkwardly as he folded his arms over his chest for a moment and let his dark eyes flicker from one person's face to another in an effort to gauge their reactions.

Captain Rogers was really the only one out of the lot that didn't react with shock or disbelief. Though he did narrow his eyes at him and _stare_ rather hard at him as one of the others finally managed to stammer out, "S-Several h-hundred-"

"Years. Yes."

"How?"

"Well, to be perfectly honest. I'm...not really human. So I tend to age differently than you do. To date, I'm about four hundred and thirty three years old. And I've been here, in your world, for about three hundred and seventy of those years."

"So...this would be a super, super long story then." Tony said questioningly. Kisuke chuckled at him and slowly nodded his head.

"Yeah, I'm afraid so-" He said and then abruptly shut his mouth as he heard Orihime calling his name right outside of the room. The door slid open and the girl peeked in to check for him and upon finding him, slipped inside of the room and skipped over to him and seated herself next to him and slipped her arms around his neck and hugged him.

"Found you!" She chirped happily.

"So you have. I'm guessing that Rukia is also awake now."

"Yup. And so is Ichigo, though you might want to avoid her for now."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Renji made the mistake of dumping some cold water over their heads as a prank."

Kisuke cringed a little bit at Renji's stupidity and asked in a half joking tone, "So- I need to help get rid of the body then?"

"What body?" Orihime asked curiously. "Ichigo has already buried him in the training room. So I doubt that he'll be found anytime soon."

The man blanched a little bit and then cast his guests an apologetic look and then quickly pried the girl's arms from around his neck and jumped to his feet and ran to the door yelling, "Code red! Tessai, get a shovel- now! We have a code red!" As he slipped out of the room, running.

Orihime made a happy sound as Tony whined, "Aww. He was going to tell us stuff!"

Before Steve asked in a slightly wary tone, "Does a 'code red' happen often, Miss?"

"Sometimes. But Ichigo usually isn't the one responsible. Though the fact that after all this time, he thinks that she would even cause a code red is just a little bit funny. I mean, has he even _met_ her. She's so nice," Orihime said with a grin as she propped her chin in her palm and eyed them with a peculiar expression before then asking, "So...what was Kisuke going to tell you?"

"Stuff about how he isn't human." Nat said.

"Oh? Is that all? That's disappointing. I thought that he'd be telling you guys war stories or something at the very least."

"Wait, wait, wait-" Tony muttered as he lifted his head from Clint's shoulder and pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment before then asking in a dismayed tone, "You mean that you know that that guy isn't human?"

"Huh? Oh sure." Orihime said. "I've known that he wasn't human ever since Ichigo pointed _that_ out to me. She's sort of like a inhuman radar. She doesn't even have to talk to someone to know. She just has to be in the room or in close proximity to them for less than a minute. It's really sort of cool. Though it does tend to land her in serious trouble from time to time." She rambled as they listened to her.

And then once she finished speaking, Clint asked. "So...you're friend can somehow sense when someone is...uh..."

"Not human?" Orihime supplied helpfully and got a nod from the man before then saying, "Basically."

"And she's never been wrong? I mean, made a mistake about it?" Tony asked curiously.

"Nope. She's never been wrong." Orihime said with a slightly thoughtful expression on her face before she started to ramble again. "What's even cooler is that she can automatically tell the good ones from the bad ones. I for one have been dying for her to teach me how to weed out the good and bad ones. But she just thins her lips when I ask her to show me how she does it and starts to ignore me. I think it upsets her."

"S-She can tell when a person isn't human. And can even seem to tell the good ones from the bad ones- and talking about it _upsets_ her?"

"Mm-hm." Orihime hummed. "I think it has something to do with the first time she had a run in with some inhuman people. It's also how she met Mr. Urahara. Anyways, she found a couple of bad inhuman guys doing really terrible things like kidnapping people and hurting others and decided to go after them and stop them."

"Sounds like a really bad move on her part." Tony said dryly.

"You're not wrong," Orihime said with a tight lipped smile before continuing. "Kisuke told us that he could sense her fighting them for _miles_ and decided to go and investigate since having such non-human activity was rare in these parts back then- He found her a little while later hacked to pieces, and left to die in a deserted area of the city. He doesn't say a lot about the incident either since it made him really mad to find a twelve year old kid in such a state. And...I wouldn't totally swear to it, but I think that once he had Ichigo back here and was sure that she'd live- he might have gone after them himself. He simply seems like the type, ya know."

"So he found her and saved her life?"

"Yeah. He didn't even care that she knew that he wasn't human either. From what I've gathered from previous conversations and stuff with him, Mr. Urahara has been alone for a really, really long time and has had little to do with the people around him. So when Ichigo figured out what he was- it was like a huge_ relief_ to him. He could finally be himself without any worry or concern that he might freak her out. That kind of acceptance is difficult to find in another person. Especially one as young as Ichigo was. But she accepted him totally without question and became his friend."

Everyone remained quiet for several heartbeats before the red headed woman asked, "But what if he were a bad person?"

"Then he'd be dead."

"But what if-"

Orihime shook her head no and then said again, making sure to emphasize the words. _"He. Would. Be. Dead." _Before then tacking on, "As grateful as Ichigo was to have her life saved by him. If Mr. Urahara were one of the bad ones, she would have killed him a long time ago to prevent others from possibly getting hurt by him. Regardless of any attachments or personal feelings towards him."

"But-" Tony started to say something this time but was abruptly cut off by a cushion to the face. Which somehow managed to knock him over as the girl glared in his direction before saying in a pissy tone.

"I want you to listen and actually hear what I say. We don't have Avengers here to save us when something happens. We aren't as lucky as the rest of the world. No one gives a damn if someone invades our home and fucks it up or even if we're wiped out! We have Ichigo. She's the closest thing to an Avenger as we can get, despite her age and civilian status." Tony's head popped up and he looked at her for a moment. A frown marring his face as she continued. "You have no idea how wretched things have been since the last incident- You think your battle for New York was a trial? I fucking _dare_ you to try fending off aliens and crap here. You would be dead within a week!"

"When I say that Ichigo is the closest thing to an Avenger that we have- I mean she's practically all of you rolled into one person. She's the Avenger's Avenger. I mean my god, do you have any idea just what she faces on a day to day basis? Here's a hint- Loki looks like a fluffy bunny by comparison! She's faced gods, madmen, crazed scientists, secret organizations similar to the one that held each of you captive-"

Her voice raised a bit and she started to yell. "I mean _who_ the hell do you think organized and implemented a way to find and rescue you while covering your asses to keep the world from knowing that you were gone? Especially since the baddies would have had a frigging field day once they knew that you weren't around to save people or stop them!"

The door to the room slid open and a really, really tall guy with dark wavy shoulder length hair, and a white muscle shirt walked in and moved over to the girl who stopped shouting at them instantly and tipped her head back to look at the newcomer before squeaking.

"Chad!"

"Why are you yelling at these people?" The guy's voice was deep, and quiet with a weird rumbling quality that had everyone staring at him oddly.

"Because that guy over there said something dumb." Orihime said as she pointed towards Tony, who had for some reason had yet to completely sit up. Probably because he didn't want another cushion to the face.

The guy made a humming sound and bent over at the waist a little bit and surprised everyone by kissing the top of Orihime's head and then moved away from her a step before simply saying, "Don't yell at people." And then turned and walked over to the far corner of the room and seated himself on the floor in a reclining position with his back resting against the wall.

Orihime huffed and muttered sullenly something along the lines of,_ "They started it." _

* * *

Around breakfast the place was exactly the madhouse that Urahara had warned them of. By the time everyone was present, there were damn near twenty people crammed into the same room that they had been sitting in. Which had included a couple more kids that they hadn't even seen before, a few adults in their twenties. And of course, even a _cat _that apparently was channeling it's inner tazmanian devil.

The damned thing was so set of hissing and spitting at everyone that tried to touch or pet it that it was making_ everyone_ nervous. It kept startling Tony so badly that he'd had to be rescued from it by Ichigo after it had damn near given him a heart attack three times.

However once that was done, and the cat was snatched up before it could scare anyone else, and Ichigo slowly made her way back to where she'd been sitting where she placed the cat in her lap and started to feed it off of her plate. Soothing the savage little beast to the point where it sprawled itself across her legs and purred, loudly.

The place was so lively during breakfast that none of them could stop listening to everyone try to talk over one another. And the moment that it was over and the place fell quiet again, Ichigo walked over to them and paused for a moment as she adjusted the cat purring on her shoulder and said softly, "You're friends will be here in the next fifteen minutes or so."

"How do you know?" Tony asked curiously, doubting her. She merely smiled at him and then turned and wandered off somewhere and didn't show up again until fifteen minutes had passed at which time she helped Nat up off of the floor, and then tugged Tony to his feet and motioned for all of them to follow her.

She led them down a series of halls and then to the front of Urahara's shop where they could see shelves of candy and other things as she walked over to the door and threw it open and happily said, "Look who I've got here!"

After which each of them heard Thor, Bucky, Bruce and Pepper talking all at once and quickly pushed the kid aside and stepped out of the shop and were reunited with their friends and loved ones.


	4. Chapter 4

"Stevie, your okay!" Bucky said as he hugged his best friend again. He sounded as if he couldn't believe that the blond was still totally intact. And maybe he couldn't, after all, if anyone knew exactly what Hydra was capable of- it was Bucky.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm...good." Steve said as Bucky squeezed him just a fraction tighter.

"I was worried when I woke up in the infirmary and found out that you and the others were gone." Bucky finally said as he slowly, and reluctantly let Steve go. "I wanted to mount a search and rescue, but Cho sort of shot me with a ton of sedative darts and then once I was down she had Bruce help her to tie me up."

He cast a weird look towards Bruce from over his shoulder and then said, "I think he's sweet on her." Bruce made a funny choking sound since he was close enough to hear Bucky before his friend then added. "Either that or he's just_ really_ into bondage."

Bruce made another weird sound and glared at Bucky.

"Damn right." Bruce muttered in a deadpan tone that had Steve nearly cracking up as Bucky turned to the other man and snarked,

"You could at least bought me dinner first! My momma didn't raise me to be a man whore!" Steve made a peculiar squeaking sound and hid his burning face as Bucky tacked on in an irked tone, "And how come you ain't even a little bit repentant?!"

"Why would I be? You're alive, Steve's alive- what is there to be repentant about?"

Bucky glared at the smaller man as Bruce gave him an shit eating smile before he then turned back to Steve and said, "Ya see what I've been putting up with because of you, punk."

Steve laughed, "I promise that I'll never go after Hydra and leave you to Bruce's not so tender mercies again."

"_Thank you_. That's all I ask." Bucky said with a grin when they all heard a yelp that sounded suspiciously like Tony's and turned their heads just in time to see Pepper smack the genius again.

"Ow! Pepper!"

"You idiot! How dare you just up and disappear on me _again_!" She shrieked at him and then smacked him again. Tony yelped again and tried to move away from her, but dammit she followed him. Her hands smacking at him while she alternated between cussing him and telling him not to worry her like that ever again.

Ichigo walked over to where Bruce was standing, curiously watching the funny little debacle when the man glanced over at her and then smiled as he said. "Hello. Who are you?"

"Ichigo. You?"

"I'm Bruce Banner." He said as he held a hand out for her to shake.

It was a move that somewhat startled even him since he didn't generally shake hands with anyone. He was always more than a little bit super paranoid that the gamma radiation in him would somehow affect anyone that he touched. So when she lifted a small hand to take his own, he was more than a little bit torn between quickly jerking his hand away and seeing if she was brave enough to risk the possibility of gamma radiation poisoning and blinked when her hand wrapped around his own.

Her grip was gentle, yet firm.

She shook his hand once and then slowly released his hand and dropped her arm back to her side as Tony finally managed to talk Pepper out of killing him right then and quickly scurried over to them and grabbed the girl and unceremoniously pulled her forward.

"Pepper! Rhodey, Thor, Barnes, Brucie-bear! This is Ichigo. She's the one that literally snuck onto the Hydra base and freed us with her band of misfit teens!" Tony said a little bit to excitedly as he pushed her in front of him so that Pepper and the others could get a good look at her.

The poor girl automatically went from totally relaxed to wanting to flee in zero point two seconds. Steve could see it in her expression as easily as the rest of them could and cast Tony a look that promised him _pain_ if he didn't let the kid go and leave her the fuck alone.

Tony noticed the look that he was giving him, and abruptly released her and then stood back a little bit and watched as the kid quickly turned and tried to run away only to be caught by Thor.

Well, sort of.

The action that got her trapped again was a weird mix of a hug, and a choke hold and a clothesline. It was all around her neck and _tight_ since Thor was squeezing her so tightly that it was a wonder that the poor girl's head didn't pop right off before Steve and Bucky quickly moved to pry her from the man's grasp before she could expire.

Once Thor's arms were pried from her, she staggered forward several steps before resting her hands on her knees and coughing. Bucky took up a protective position on one side of her and absently reached out to rub her back as Thor tried to apologize for accidentally almost killing her. While being semi held back by Steve who looked both worried and just a little bit pissed by what had just happened.

"Ya alright doll?" Bucky asked curiously as he kept rubbing her back as she quickly nodded her head between coughs.

"I'm fine, I'm fine," She said once she was able to finally catch her breath again and slowly straightened her spine as he dropped his hand before she then said to him/them, "I've have much worse than simply being hugged wrong before- so really, I'm good." And as much as she said she was fine, the slight rasping sound of her voice coupled with the small wince of discomfort from having to force herself to speak, told them that she was_ lying_.

If only to prevent Steve from punching Thor in the throat. And so that Thor- the big, oblivious lug that he is- from feeling badly for accidentally hurting her.

It was sweet of her to try and disarm the situation before it escalated any further, really it was. But it didn't stop Steve from still cocking his fist back to lay Thor out on his ass.

However before he could even follow through with the blow- she moved faster than Bucky had ever seen somebody move before- and had Steve by the scruff of the neck and was _dragging_ him away from Thor.

Steve swung at the air several times before it even seemed to register with him that he wasn't landing any blows on the other blond. She dragged him over to Bucky and then rudely thrust Steve at him and muttered, "This yours? I think you lost him." As Bucky grabbed the blond before he could fall flat on his face.

"Yeah, thanks doll." He said, in a amused tone as she sent a glare at Steve that by all rights should have had the punk scampering for cover before then walking back over to Thor and calmly laid a hand on his arm in a soothing manner and spoke softly in a calming tone, helping to ease the big guy's anxiety.

Thor apologized to her a couple more times before finally seeming to settle down with a bright smile as Pepper walked over to the girl and waiting until she was looking at her before she introduced herself to her.

"Hi, my name is Virgina Potts. But everyone calls me Pepper. I'm Tony's good friend and wrangler- Thank you so much for finding him and the others. We were very worried about them."

Ichigo didn't say anything, she merely nodded her head slowly at the woman's polite/odd rambling as she caught the woman looking her over strangely. Probably taking note of various characteristics and things.

Ichigo tended to do the same thing too whenever she met someone new and somewhat interesting. Though not quite to the extent that the woman was. She seemed to be sort of dissecting her with her eyes. It was sort of creepy, really.

"How old are you sweetheart?" The woman finally managed to ask. Ah, so that was what Miss Potts had been looking at her so hard for. She had been trying to gauge her age. It probably bothered her that she wasn't able to tell Ichigo's age accurately. But then, not many people could unless they knew her actual birthday.

"I'm sixteen, Ma'am."

"S-Six- _Tony!_" Pepper stammers for a moment before screaming, causing everyone in their little group to flinch as Tony deadpans,

"I'm not coming over there if you're going to hit me again."

"Yes you will," Pepper snapped back at him automatically before then saying, "I thought that you were fucking kidding when you called her a kid. Because you call everyone under twenty five a kid. If I had known that she was sixteen..." Something dangerous flickered in the woman's expression and Ichigo, no matter how brave or strong she was, found herself quickly and as subtly as possible- edging herself _away_ from the woman.

After all, if she'd hit the man- she'd probably smack her too. Or at least that was how she reasoned her sudden need to _move away_, anyways.

She maybe managed to get about three tiny steps into her little escape when Rukia and Kisuke and several of the others came tearing out of the shop and ran up shouting.

"Ichigo!" Rukia was the first to reach her, brushing by the startled Miss Potts and quickly handing Ichigo one of Kisuke's customized touch pads which had several different small windows on it as Rukia quickly explained, "There's trouble in subway station thirty six. There's police and news reports of the train being a runaway. Apparently someone fucked with both the end of the track, and the breaks on the train- Kisuke figures that if it isn't stopped soon...it'll flip."

Ichigo took several moments to look at each window, taking note of the location of the train, the 'simulation' Kisuke had made of what would happen if it flipped and checking out the police and news feeds before then looking back up at Rukia.

"How many people?"

"There are close to four hundred and six on the train. And if it flips like the simulation calculated it will- _Thousands_. The area at the end of the track is riddled with gas mains so I think you already know what would happen."

"Boom."

_"Boom."_ Rukia confirmed with a curt nod of her head as Ichigo handed the touch pad back to her and then looked at Kisuke and the others for a moment and nodded her head, her mind already working out the vague beginnings of a plan.

"Chad, I need Uryu, Renji, Rukia and Orihime to try evacuating the subway. Get as many people out and to safety as you possibly can. Kisuke, I don't care how you do it but I need you to evacuate every building, shop and street for three- no make that _five_ miles in each direction, just in case. You may need to call in some help from the others."

"I can do that."

"Good. Then I'll take care of the train." Ichigo said.

"How?"

"I'm going to run it down and catch a ride."

_"What?!"_ Several people all shouted at once. It was difficult to tell which of her friends and which of the Avenger's group were the ones shouting at her. But it didn't really matter.

"Ichigo be reasonable." Uryu said before tacking on. "Not that we don't have any faith in you or anything, but that train is already running at over a hundred fifty miles per hour and will soon hit two hundred miles per hour. You really think that you can catch it at this point?"

"Yes."

The blue haired teen shrugged his shoulders, "Well...it's not like catching a speeding train on foot is the stupidest thing that you've ever done. However will you be able to catch it and pry one of the doors open while running at that speed? Last time I checked, you walked yourself right into a tree while trying to chew bubble gum and walk at the same time."

"Shut up." Ichigo muttered before then turning and disappearing into thin air before everyone's eyes.

There were several shouts and a couple of startled oaths from the Avengers and their people while Kisuke merely tugged his hat down a little bit over his eyes and asked, "You guys ready to begin?"


	5. Chapter 5

Kisuke and the kids were about to leave to go do what they had been told to do when Steve's voice stopped them. "Hey wait!" Everyone paused for a second before Rukia and the others decided to go on and let Kisuke handle the Avengers since they couldn't really afford to simply stop and stand around and indulge the others in idle chat while Ichigo was busy chasing down a train.

There was a slight possibility that she might miss her chance and need their help. Just in case something unforeseen occurred.

"We're going on ahead to begin evacuating people!" Rukia called out as she and the others scampered off. Kisuke huffed quietly and scowled at their backs for a moment in irritation. Though he understood their reasons well enough.

"We can help you all-" Steve started to say when Kisuke cut him off.

"With all due respect Captain, neither you nor your friends are well enough nor rested enough to help us with this. It's best if all of you go on home and take care of yourselves."

"But-" Steve started to protest when Bucky chimed in this time and interrupted him. "That may be, but at least three of us are well enough to help."

"I doubt that you can chase down a runaway train going over a hundred miles per hour." Kisuke wasn't trying to be mean, really he wasn't. But he knew that as fast as the super soldiers could run- it wouldn't be enough. Just like he was fairly certain that even Thor couldn't stop the train despite how physically strong he was. And there was no chance whatsoever that he was dare to suggest that the Hulk be unleashed in a subway tunnel.

Even if he stopped the train, the damage would be _phenomenal_. And the loss of life, even accidentally- just as staggering. Plus it would piss Ichigo off if several city blocks were utterly demolished over one little run away train, and he feared that her territorial nature would cause her to attempt to beat the ever loving hell out of the Hulk if he did allow the Avengers to help.

So again, his answer was a very strong _no_.

The man chewed his lip for a moment before saying in a slightly dark tone, "You're right, I can't. But that doesn't mean that those kids should be involved in this. They could get hurt or die."

Ah, so that was the actual root of the problem at the moment.

Protective instinct was something that Kisuke understood very well. He had his own protective instinct when it came to Ichigo and the others, after all. He'd grown very fond of each of them since the day that they had all met.

They were rare creatures in his world. Their abilities allowing them to walk the line between human and other as easily as it was to breathe. But walking the line as often as they did tended to come with more health risks, potential enemies, and other threats that he couldn't even _begin_ to imagine. Much less begin to name.

"That's true, however- you're underestimating them and their abilities." Kisuke said easily before going on to explain. "Those kids have been doing things like this long before they ever met me, Sergeant Barnes. Ichigo, Chad, Rukia and Renji especially."

"All of them have been going on jobs _and_ missions- taking down domestic terrorists, kidnappers, yakuza, drug pushers, and human traffickers since they were much younger. Why Ichigo alone has been at this since she was _seven_ years old. I believe that by now, they each are very much aware of the risks that go hand in hand with what they are doing."

"And you do nothing to stop them." Pepper said in an angry tone. Kisuke gave the woman an sad smile.

"I couldn't no matter how hard I tried. I don't know if any of you are totally aware of it just yet- but Ichigo is the only authority that those kids recognize. They don't listen to me outside of advice. They listen to _her_. She's their leader- the one who will do anything and everything possible and some stuff even impossible to comprehend- just to bring them all home safely."

"You sound as if you're speaking from personal experience." Bruce said as he studied the blond for a moment. The man looked a tad bit startled by the comment before reaching up and tugging the brim of his hat down a little bit more over his eyes before he said,

"I've lost count of how many times that kid has walked through blood. Stepped over corpses and wrestled with demons- both _literally_ and_ figuratively_\- just to carry someone we thought was lost to us forever, back home again on her back. And if none of you believe me..." He lifted the touch pad in his hand and tossed it to Bucky before saying, "Watch them. I can promise you that Ichigo _will_ run that train down and stop it. Just like I can guarantee that no one will be severely hurt or killed. Those kids won't allow it. Now if you'll excuse me- I have to go and help evacuate people just to be safe."

And with that he turned and started running in the direction that the kids had gone. He'd wasted enough of his breath on non believers. Now it was time to finally get some work done.

* * *

There was something both fun and utterly terrifying about chasing down a train speeding uncontrollably through the subway tunnels on foot. It was fun because, hello, she liked running and chasing after things. Seeing how fast she could go and how much she could push herself before her body was torn completely apart.

And terrifying because she kept betting mental images of the speeding train flipping. Of the passengers inside of the cars screaming while the sides and the windows were shattered and torn open. Of people getting impaled, dragged underneath the heavy, twisted and sparking metal and being crushed or having their limbs ripped off and left bleeding and dying before the whole thing was swallowed up by a fire ball that could take out several city blocks.

So naturally, she tried to think of anything but that since she loathed the idea of failure.

She had been gaining on the runaway train several inches at a time as she steadily increased her speed bit by bit. And oh man was she really feeling it too. Her muscles and tendons were practically shredding themselves to pieces and coming apart bit by agonizing bit.

Her lungs were screaming for air that she couldn't seem to catch long enough to keep her vision from going spotty every few moments or so.

She was getting dizzy, and could taste the copper of blood on the back of her tongue from the strain that she was putting on herself. Already both of the bones in her ankles and legs and upper thighs had snapped in several places under the pressure of how fast she was running.

She knew that it was only a matter of time before her body gave out on her. But she refused to let something as miniscule as the pain steadily spreading along her nerves like living fire- stop her from her task.

She put on another burst of speed as the train went around a small curve, her expression darkening like a thunder cloud as she heard the loud scraping of metal against stone, and the terrified screams of the people huddled as far away from the side of the car scraping itself against the side of the tunnel as humanly possible.

Her feet came up off of the track and she used her momentum to fling herself against the side of the tunnel and sling shot herself after the train until she was close enough to reach it. Putting one of her hands out, she grabbed the back of it and let it drag her along for a moment before jumping up on a small piece of metal sticking out from under the train and used it as a perch so that she could pry the door open.

* * *

"I'll be fucking damned," Tony said in an awe filled tone as he peered at the touch pad from his place next to Pepper. "She actually caught it."

Steve and Bucky remained silent as Clint, Nat, Bruce, Tony and Thor all exchanged excited looks and high fived each other. They knew that they were celebrating a little bit too soon since the train was still on the move, but the fact that the girl had actually managed to do something so impossible was nothing short of _amazing_ to them.

"She's hurt." Bucky said as he noted the odd way that she was moving. Shifting herself around and trying to take as much weight as possible off of her legs without falling off.

The smiles left the others faces as they turned to look at him questioningly.

"She's damaged her legs. Probably torn apart the muscles, ligaments, and broken the bones. And she looks like she's having trouble breathing too. And I can see a little bit of blood running down her chin from her mouth. She's probably damaged her organs as well. It'll be a miracle if she manages to do anything once she's inside aside from pass out or die."

"Shit. Seriously?" Clint said in a worried tone. Bucky and Steve both nodded and the blond started swearing and anxiously running his fingers though his hair and pulling at it as Nat reached out and laid a hand on his back to try and calm him.

The girl managed to pry the door open after several tries and they could see several hands reaching out to grab her and pull her in just in time for the train to go around another curve and slam into the side of the tunnel violently. Throwing the kid and others to the floor.

"She's inside." Bruce said.

They couldn't see much of what happened next since the cameras on the train were crappy and gave them a vague idea of what the kid did next. But it went something like this.

She got everyone to move to several of the back cars after testing the emergency brake to see if it would work. And after she was sure that it would, she somehow separated the back cars and damaged one of the wheels on two of the cars to force them to slow down while someone pulls the emergency brakes.

Leaving her on the still speeding train while everyone else was safe.

She took several moments to catch her breath before struggling to her feet and then went through all of the cars and began knocking some of the middle ones over onto their sides. Slowing the run away train considerably.

It was horrifying for them to watch.

Especially since none of them thought that it would work.

But by the time she had knocked several of the middle and ending cars over onto their sides and forced the train to slow down- it was over. The last thing that she did was rip the wires attached to the motor and control panel out. Bringing an end to whole ordeal before collapsing.


	6. Chapter 6

**Sorry, short chap. **

**Can't think...**

* * *

Ichigo awoke with a shuddering gasp that turned into a scream of pain. Her mind going from blank to working to blank again in the span of seconds. _Everything hurt! _Every part of her body felt like one huge exposed nerve or something. Everything burned, and throbbed, and hurt and ached so badly that she couldn't think beyond forcing herself to take one breath after another.

She was only vaguely aware of her friend's presence around her. And only because each of them was so distressed that their power was pushing at her viciously. Forcing her to feel them and their distress.

She curled her hands into tight fists and gritted her teeth so hard that she heard something snap and then tasted the coppery tang of blood flooding her mouth causing her to gag and then quickly twist around onto her side- ignoring the bone jarring ache in her torso- so that she could vomit.

She didn't hear Rukia's comment about her spitting up a few of her teeth. Nor did she feel Kisuke or Chad trying to help her by holding her onto her side so that she wouldn't choke any.

The pain lessened bit by bit over the next few minutes. Slowly, gradually- _Orihime must be close by._ Was the first coherent thought that entered her mind aside from how much easier it was to breathe now. It didn't hurt as much and she wasn't struggling as if she were being held under water anymore.

It was a wonderful feeling. And something that she deeply appreciated. Even if she did go into a painful coughing fit the first time she took a truly deep breath.

Feeling someone's hands combing through her hair was the next thing that she gradually became aware of. Long fingers, rough skin, blunt nails- _Kisuke_. She was fairly certain that it was Kisuke that was combing her hair with his fingers in a comforting manner.

Though she expected Chad to shove him aside any moment now so that he could take his place.

After how badly she'd fucked herself up, it would be nothing short of a miracle if her giant friend so much as even let her out of his sight for a good four to six months afterwards.

"Easy, Ichigo." Kisuke said as he kept brushing her sweat slicked hair back from her face. "You've really put yourself through the ringer this time-" He saw her lips move, yet nothing- no sound beyond a rattling breath escaped her. "Don't try to talk, kid. You need to conserve your strength. We still need to get you home, and I'm not going to lie; after the way that you tore yourself to pieces- I-It's gonna really, really hurt."

She made a weird, strangled sounding choking sound and tried to push herself up a little bit more. Likely testing how much pain her body was going to be in with the slight movement since her pain scale wasn't anything like a normal persons one to ten gauge.

No- Ichigo's pain scale went from one to one hundred and ten. The smaller numbers didn't even register with her. So they'd had to broaden the scale and used it to see how she felt when her pain threshold hit a specific number. Luckily anything under a seventy five was fair enough to only require a moderate amount of help, medical care and medicine. However anything above a seventy five was thought of as severe, life threatening, and in some more severe cases, even crippling.

So when she moved that little bit, Kisuke found himself holding his breath for a moment before he heard her gasp out, "Fuck." In a strangled and barely audible tone, that had them all cringing a little bit, before she promptly passed back out.

"_Shit_. Orihime, can you keep the Soten Kisshun on her while we move?"

"I think so." Orihime said with a grimly determined look.

"Alright, I'm going to carry her. Chad, you and Renji take the lead. If anyone tries to stop us from leaving the area- knock them out. Rukia, I need you to call Issun and have him meet us back at the shop. I also need you to contact Tessai and let him know that we need him to set up a place for us to put Ichigo until she's more stable and in less pain."

"Right!"

"Okay kids, lets go." Kisuke said as he slipped his hands underneath Ichigo's still form and made quick work of carefully turning her onto her back without jarring her any more than absolutely necessary and then lifted her up off of the cold ground and cradled her close to his chest and looked at the kids to indicate that he was ready to move.

* * *

"Do you think her friends reached her in time?" Pepper asked worriedly. In light of all of them meeting the group of 'hero's' consisting mostly of kids, Tony and the others had decided to stick around for a little bit longer. Not that Pepper could blame them any.

She seriously doubted that nothing short of fire and brimstone and absolute hell on earth would have moved Thor, Steve, Bucky, Tony, Nat or Clint so much as an inch anyways. Bruce seemed content to merely follow everyone else's lead. Though it was difficult for the man to disguise his own peculiar interest in the kid, Ichigo.

Again, Pepper couldn't blame them. They'd all witnessed a marvel firsthand through the video footage of the train and the tunnels.

And any sixteen year old kid that could run down a train going two hundred miles per hour and save hundreds or possibly thousands of people from becoming injured or worse deserved to have nothing _but_ their undivided attention. It was simply how people with enhancements and mutations worked.

It was nice to meet someone just like them. And it was rarer still for that person to be on the same side as them. So of course everyone would have their interest's piqued.

Plus there was also the fact that she had saved them and she was currently hurt or worse. That _alone_ would have made them all plant themselves anyways regardless of the actual train incident's outcome.

Because when someone had the eyes of the Avenger's on them, it was a lot like having the eye of Sauron on them. Shit got both interesting, and crazy- very, very quickly. And it was beginning to look more and more as if the kid, Ichigo's life was about to become both very interesting and crazy by incredible leaps and bounds.

Pepper wasn't really sure at this point who she sort of pitied more. Ichigo. Or the others. But she was already leaning towards the others. Simply because he didn't know the girl well enough to judge how she would handle having her life entwined with theirs.

"The camera's went out about three minutes and seven seconds after her collapse. So either they reached her in time- or something else happened." Bucky said somberly, part of him was bitterly angry about the whole damn incident.

I mean, who the fuck sent _children_ to do the job of adults anyways? He didn't care if this was the kid's home town or if they each had abilities or not. He'd just watched a video of someone's daughter- someone's fucking _baby_\- literally rip herself to shreds internally and was more than a little bit tempted to beat the fuck out of the blond guy once he got back if that kid was dead.

Hell he might still beat the guys ass on principle. That is, if Steve and Tony and Clint didn't beat him to it. They all looked as pissed as he felt.

Steve had a literal thundercloud over his head. His expression was eerily dark and frightening.

Behind him, Thor, Clint, and Tony were all pacing and running into each other. And then shoving each other out of the way with a few choice words, and then pacing again.

Which might have been funny under less severe circumstances.

Next to him, both Bruce and Nat were watching the others move a lot like animals in a cage would. Someone might have said something, maybe. If not for the fact that their loitering around shady-guy's place was interrupted by a couple of little kids no older than ten or so.

One was a girl in a light yellow sweater with white pants. And the other was a girl with shoulder length black hair wearing a red baseball cap, a white and red baseball themed shirt, and black spandex biker shorts.

"Come on Yuzu-" The dark haired one said as she tugged the other girl along behind her. "Stop dragging your feet! Ichigo will be back soon and Dad is going to need us to help him fix her up so we have to make sure that Mr. Tessai's got everything ready."

The other girl, Yuzu, didn't say anything. She was a little bit busy eyeing them curiously as her friend dragged her through their group and then disappeared into the building.

"Tell me I didn't just see two more kids walk into that shop." Tony said all of a sudden.

"You did. There were two of them." Steve confirmed in a rough tone as he clenched his teeth just a little bit harder. Bucky heard something pop and took a moment to glance around at everyone else, wondering if they heard the small sound too.

They didn't. Either that or they were flat out ignoring the possibility that Steve had just broken a few teeth. He startled to settle back down to wait when the girl with the shoulder length dark hair suddenly came walking back out of the shop and Bucky perked up some.

Some of his old habits from way, way back in the day kicking in as he curiously watched the kid walk up to them and then cross her arms over her chest and take a moment to look them all over for a moment and then sighed and slowly shook her head before saying to herself. "Man, Ichigo needs to stop adopting barely functioning adults. She's much too damn young to be a mamma to you lot."

Everyone looked at her oddly for a moment before she pointed at Pepper, Bruce, Bucky and Nat and said. "Except you guys. I can totally see her adopting all of you."

Pepper was the first one to manage to shake off the shock of the girls words long enough to ask, "Oh? Why's that?"

"You guys seem like you need someone to keep you safe- well, safer. And if there's one thing Ichigo excels at; it's keeping people _safer_..." She got quiet for a moment and popped her knuckles menacingly before then saying, "Now if you'll excuse me, dear nieces and nephews- I've got to find my dad. If he's still even slightly hung over from his night of binge drinking the streets are going to run red with his blood." And then stomped off.


	7. Chapter 7

Ichigo's mind drifted back to consciousness a lot like a computer that had crashed and just finished being repaired. One second she was out. And the next- everything was functioning again. She wasn't feeling all that good. Hell she wasn't even feeling all that great.

But once she got her bearings enough to lift her head a bit and scan the others for injuries, and caught sight of poor Orihime. She narrowed her eyes at the other girl having to lean against Rukia just to stay upright and made a snap decision to make her stop using Soten Kisshun _immediately _before she collapsed or something.

"O-Orihime…" She rasped, her voice was barely louder than a whisper. Yet the others were so intune to her that they knew what she was trying to do almost automatically.

"Orihime, you can stop healing Ichigo now." Kisuke said without pausing. He knew that despite Ichigo being awake now, it was only a matter of time before she was overwhelmed by pain again. They were still a few minutes away from the shop, and he was hoping that Issun and Tessai had everything in place already.

Cause if not, then he'd have to sic Yuzu and Karin on them both.

And as much as a scary hell raiser as Karin Kurosaki could be. Yuzu was much, _much_ worse.

"We're almost at the shop Ichigo…" Kisuke said as he gripped her just a tad bit tighter in his arms to prevent her from doing something stupid. Like squirming until he dropped her.

He'd made the mistake of doing that a time or two after something happened and she got herself injured, and it wasn't an experience that he cared to repeat anytime soon. Especially since he'd been on everyone's shit list for months.

Why even sweet and normally timid Orihime had gotten in on the action and had started to send him weird, threatening cards that looked as if a serial killer had guided her hand. It'd been super freaky, and to be perfectly honest it had scared the hell out of him. So much so that Tessai and the kids had gotten involved and then they'd all been on everyone's shit list.

Well, except for Ichigo's. She hadn't cared that he'd dropped her.

Which was why he'd nabbed her and sort of held her hostage until the others had backed off.

Ichigo tipped her head back a little bit to look at him, and did this weird full body spasm that had him growling out, "Stop moving!"

Because as much as Orihime had healed the shredded muscles and tendons and her ruptured organs and stuff- the poor girl hadn't been able to heal _everything_. It was why lingering traces of agony was still present in Ichigo's body. Which was just another reason why she needed to_ stop_ moving before she accidentally damaged herself further.

The second that she heard him snap, Ichigo went completely and utterly still. More out of surprise than actual fear or concern for her well being. She'd been dropped by him enough to know that he disliked it when she squirmed. She also knew that he absolutely _loathed_ the aftermath of dropping her as well.

Kisuke and captivity, even in the smallest and most amusing of ways- simply didn't mix.

"Sorry." She rasped softly.

"Don't apologize," He said in a much softer tone this time. "Just stay still."

"But-"

"No 'but's' kid. Stay still." Kisuke said in a no nonsense tone as Ichigo huffed and lay her head on his shoulder and tried to do as he said. But it was hard to stay still when Orihime and Rukia both fell flat on their faces behind them.

* * *

The girl hadn't been joking about the streets running red with the blood of her father. Which was both utterly ridiculous and weirdly scary at the same time. Especially since she returned to the...wherever the fuck they were barely ten minutes after leaving it- _dragging_ a forty something year old man who definitely looked as if he'd seen better days, behind her by his hair.

All of them watched the weird spectacle with varying expressions of horror, bemusement, and disbelief as she dragged the nearly one hundred and seventy pound man past them. Totally ignoring them as she did so.

"Uh...excuse me, kid-" Tony started to say when she cast him a dark look that reminded him eerily of Pepper whenever she was in a snit, and caused him to abruptly shut his mouth.

"Ichigo and the others will be back here in ten minutes._ Try_ to stay out of their way." The girl said as she shifted her hold on the man from his hair to his beard. The guy let out a loud, ear piercing shriek before she unceremoniously dropped him and then turned around and kicked him in the back of the shoulder. _Hard_.

"Shut. Up!" She snarled at him before then shouting. "You are the most unbelievably irresponsible man I have ever had the displeasure of meeting. I can't believe that you went on another drinking binge last night! You _knew_ that Ichigo might have needed you to help her and you still went out drinking! What the hell is wrong with you anyways?! Why can't you act your damn age for once in your life and actually_ act_ like a dad?!"

She was practically screaming the last bit at him, while the Avenger's looked on in curiosity. She might have kicked him again, and started screaming all over again when the kids from before suddenly appeared. The platinum blond carrying the girl, Ichigo while being flanked by the giant, and the red haired guy while the others followed along behind them.

"Karin!" The blond called out as he passed them. "Please tell me that that isn't the cowering figure of your father lying at your feet." He said in a slightly disturbed tone as he eyed the man, curled up at the girl's feet.

"Mr. Urahahra, you got back faster than I expected." She said as she looked at him, taking note of the way he was carrying her sister before asking. "How's Ichigo doing?"

"She's alive and will likely be in a great deal of pain and discomfort for a while."

"How bad?"

"Bad enough to maybe keep her bedridden for a week or more," Kisuke said as he walked up to the dark haired girl and took a moment to glance down at Issun and gave an aggrieved sigh at the sight of him. "He's drunk again." It wasn't a question. Merely a statement of fact.

"Fraid so. I found him practically passed out in the ditch about half a block away from here."

Kisuke sighed again, "Get some coffee in him and sober him up. Issun and I need to have a fucking chat. Tessai will take care of Ichigo and make her comfortable-"

"Not yet." Ichigo rasped out causing him and Karin to look at her like she'd grown another head or something as she started to squirm a little bit again. "Put me down..."

"Ichigo. No, you can't-" Kisuke started to tell her no, she couldn't be moving around on her own just yet. Not until after they took care of her first and let her heal some more, however Ichigo was nothing but persistently stubborn. She squirmed until he had no choice but to put her down before he wound up dropping her again.

Once on her feet, Ichigo wobbled dangerously on sore limbs. The burning sensation felt like acid crawling along her nerve endings as she took an unsteady step away from him and after a moment of consideration she checked on her dad first. He uncurled himself slightly when he felt her near him and cast a red eyed look her way as she smiled at him to let him know that she was fine and he was forgiven for going out drinking again.

After all, despite what Kisuke and Karin thought, he wasn't a bad person. He just got depressed and resorted to drinking around this time of the year because he missed her mom more and more each year. It was sort of unavoidable given how tightly the two of them had been _bound_ together.

"Hey dad-"

He sniffled once before croaking, "Hey sweetheart." Karin snarled and started to go for him, but Kisuke quickly grabbed her and stopped her because he didn't want any blood spilled so close to his home. It would cause all kinds of legal problems for him if the girl killed her father in a fit of rage, so stopping her seemed like the better of two evils at the moment.

Though he was still going to have a_ long_ chat with his old friend about pulling himself together.

"You okay?" Ichigo asked as she watched her dad sit up some.

"I should be asking you that. I heard that you chased down a train on foot." Ichigo made a humming sound but didn't say anything. "How bad did you mess yourself up?" Issun asked as he looked her over with a frown.

"Pretty bad. Orihime fixed some of the more...severe injuries. And I can breathe again without tasting blood. So I guess that aside from the damn near crippling _pain_ in my limbs- I'm more or less okay."

"You...can't move at all right now can you?"

"Nope."

He snickered at her as she flushed in embarrassment as he slowly moved to collect her. His arm slipping around her slender waist as he easily picked her up off of the ground and tucked her underneath his arm like a football and started walking towards the shop when Ichigo called out.

"Can someone please collect my new kids and bring them indoors. They've been out in the sun for a while now!"


End file.
